Dharma Trumps Moksa
We want to start the year with the emphasis staying on living moksa, which means making a sankalpa, a resolution to living life from the nondual perspective. We unfold what this means and what it takes in most of our teachings. Over the last two weeks we discussed the idea that nobody can teach or be taught moksa because it is who we are, what is actual and real. All the same, Vedanta is a moksa shastra, meaning, it is a means of knowledge capable of removing the ignorance of your true nature as the Self, assuming the student is qualified and taught by a qualified teacher. But what it takes to live as the nondual Self requires not only qualifications and a burning desire for freedom from limitation. It means first and foremost, to live your best self (jiva) if you want to live as the Self.
What Does it Mean to Live Your Best Self
While Vedanta is not a religion, does not have dogma or tell you how to live, it does lay out what it entails to live a good, happy life. If you are tired of being unhappy and nothing else has worked, perhaps it’s time to really pay attention. If this is the case, you need to understand the importance of Vedanta first and foremost as a dharma shastra, the teachings on how to live in harmony with the natural laws that run the field of life, which includes karma yoga as well as bhakti yoga, the teachings on devotional practice. You will not make progress without all three, whether you are only after peace of mind, or moksa.
As Ramji so often points out, Swami Abedhanandha, who was a great Mahatma and jnani, taught that dharma and worship of God trumps moksa. But why? If the student puts into practice living a dharmic and devotional life impeccably, they will be perfect bhaktas and karma yogis, automatically. Peace of mind is the result because you will be living right and not rubbing up against Isvara, which is a very bad idea indeed. You will be living as your best self, which of course, is for the jiva to have a great life. As you well know, moksa is for the mind, alone. As the Self you were never and can never be bound.
If moksa, freedom from limitation is what we are after, it will require not only dharma, karma yoga and dharma yoga. Guna yoga and jnana yoga are necessary to understand and manage the mind, as well as to discriminate between satya, nonduality, and mithya, duality. But if we are truly living dharmically and devotionally, we will automatically be karma yogis managing the mind because peace of mind is non-negotiable for us. Living dharmically, and devotionally with karma yoga is not a matter of stuffy self-righteous rectitude. It is a matter of knowledge because we simply want to feel good, so we do not cause injury to ourselves or others in thought, word or deed. But that’s a tall order if you are a samsari, without Self-knowledge. So we are not saying you don’t need moksa, freedom from the hypnosis of duality. We are saying that following dharma goes a long way to take care of your jiva and you will be happy even without moksa.
What is Dharma?
Dharma, which is the law of non-injury, is complicated. Firstly because to follow dharma, we must practice karma yoga, the consecration of all action to Isvara in the spirit of gratitude and devotion. Which is to say, bhakti yoga. To further complicate things, dharma has three aspects to it, which you should all know, and I am sure, most of you do. The first layer is universal laws which have two parts: basically physics, the laws that run the field of life, which are immutable, though we have developed technology that allows us to manipulate the field, with dire consequences. The second part of universal laws are the ethics of social conduct as it applies to non-injury.
The second layer of dharma, situational ethics, is how we personally relate to the universal laws. While the law of non-injury applies across the board, there are certain situations that while seemingly causing injury, are in keeping with dharma, such as exiting a bad marriage, job etc. The final layer of dharma are the laws of non-injury as they apply to our personal jiva program or inborn nature. We all know what this means. When we go against our nature, even if we think it’s to prevent injury, to ‘get ahead and succeed” or maybe worse, “doing good”, we will get whacked by Isvara. Life will not work out smoothly for us and the prized peace of mind will remain very elusive. And if we are dedicated to moksa, not cleaning up our self-insulting habits, likes and dislikes means breaking dharma.
Fortunately for the human race, dharma is built into the jiva program by Isvara. Most humans do not feel good if we break dharma and cause injury, unless you are a psychopath who enjoys it. But thanks to the gift of self-reflectivity, intentionally or not, we can make choices that break dharma on all three levels, or that just go against our personal svadharma. Big problem. I had a great satsang recently with an advanced inquirer on this topic, and this is what I said to him about dharma, evolution and self-reflectivity.
Big Bang, Dharma and The Curse of ‘Free Will’
After the Big Bang, things were coming along nicely with the creation. Isvara was quite pleased. Earth had arrived and been through a lot, from fireball with the epic chaos of cosmic matter being created and dispersed, to the arrival of water, continents and the first aquatic single cell life forms appearing. Primitive plants emerged bestowed with the knowledge of photosynthesis, so created oxygen, which caused its own set of problems, such as the first of many snowball earths. But eventually oxygen also rid the atmosphere of the noxious mix of gases that prevailed, creating breathable air for the multicellular organisms that came next. Then, though there was no soil as such, the miracle of plants colonised land and created soil and growing things, which provided food for the first complex animal forms to appear on land.
After many iterations and extinctions of life forms, the surviving mammals inherited the kingdom of earth. It’s appealing to think of evolution in the form of God/Isvara weighing up the pros and cons of bestowing the faculty of self-reflectivity onto an upgraded animal form – and ‘creating’ thinking/feeling bipedal humans with a ‘will of their own’. Though of course, we know that God is not a person, I can use my imagination to picture God having to take a lot into consideration. On the one hand, things were quite OK without thinking humans, and probably still would be. After all, the most successful life forms on the planet then and now (e.g. bacteria) don’t have a brain and don’t think…Makes you think. Why would the Self need to think about itself in form when it’s all that is, and create ignorance of itself to boot? Maya is indeed a head scratcher.
Making humans who can think would be a lot of work – and put them at the top of the pecking order of sentient beings, seeming the roof and crown of creation. That also would make them extremely troublesome! Just take a look at the world to see how things worked out, the mess it’s in thanks to this faculty…Oi vey. Maybe Isvara should take this ‘gift’ back…Though it appears that Isvara really likes ignorance because there is so much of it!
So, God went along with the idea. Though Self-knowledge is built into all sentient life, after all, this is and always has been a nondual reality, to be on the safe side, Isvara made it difficult for the poor jiva. Maybe even went a bit overboard with ignorance…. because humans are subject to mithya, the hypnosis of duality. Which means that Self-knowledge is not easily available. Thanks to inbuilt ignorance, unlike other sentient life forms, the feeling of inadequacy, fear and worry would be jiva’s destiny, chasing answers in the world of objects, desperately seeking control. Poor jiva!
Further on down the downside, self-reflectivity makes jivas capable of not only thinking and feeling but knowing that they are thinking and feeling. With this comes relative free will (which humans mistake for complete free will). But unlike other sentient species, it does mean that humans are capable of going against their program and breaking dharma, causing much injury and suffering to themselves and to the field of life. But hold off on those razor blades and hang in there because God was merciful!
The upside is that even though it has been established that every decision we seem to make volitionally is actually preprogrammed into the system from the Causal body, we do have relative free will. If this were not the case, no success in anything would be possible for us. Why get out of bed at all? It is possible for humans to believe that they do have agency in their lives. And the big advantage of being human is that being self-reflective grants humans an eventual out-card from their expanded, but still limited, human programme. Assuming certain qualifications have developed only in a human incarnation can we realize our true identity as the unlimited Self.
Why Do I Need Bhakti Yoga?
So what’s the big deal about devotional practice? Bhakti yoga on its own can be so powerful that it saves your life. This is the case for many ordinary seekers as they navigate the rocky road of life – just look at the popularity of charismatic churches to see this in action. But devotional practice is a must for those seeking moksa, too. Not only is it an essential part of managing the childish ego, it feels really good to live a life of gratitude and consecration. As stated, Vedanta is the Science of Consciousness, not a religion. As teachers we cannot make you believe in the nondual teachings, nor do we want to.
If you believe something you always have to defend it because what you believe in, and your beliefs, could change. Lucky for us, Vedanta does not require belief because it is the logic of existence. It stands alone and can never be negated. And fortunately for us teachers, we are not in the salvation game because you don’t need saving. You are the Self. Our job is to show you why this is true, not turn you into converts. We can teach you if you are qualified for self-inquiry, but you need to follow the methodology and subject the mind to the nondual scriptures for them to assimilate. That is not on us.
If the qualifications are not developed, particularly faith in the logic, the teachings will not assimilate. This is not the faith that religion requires. It is faith pending your own investigation. Once or if Self-knowledge assimilates you don’t need faith anymore. Do you need to believe in electricity once you know what it is, and does electricity require your faith in it to work? No to both. If you follow dharma to the letter and are also practicing bhakti, devotion to God, your life will start to change for the better, and you will like yourself a whole lot more. It may not be freedom from the limitation of Maya but there is no freedom from limitation without dharma and bhakti yoga.
This is why the devotees who are against Vedanta believe that moksa only comes with being attached in every way possible to God. They are called Bhagavata Dharmam, and their scripture is shrimadbhagavatam (shrimad means the illustrious and bhagavatam means the lord, Isvara). A person who is a nondual devotee of God, known as a Gopi, is the one who drinks, or who loves God by consuming God through the senses. There is no satya mithya discrimination necessary because it is bhakti that knows no otherness, with complete attachment to God in all of life. This is a great way to live, nothing wrong with it!
Vedantaappeals to intellectuals and atheists because it seems so logical and free of dogma, which it is. But thanks to the influence of religious thinking, bhakti yoga sounds like a devotional practice, which is not as appealing. We had a question from an inquirer who just cannot understand why the teaching on God and devotional practice is necessary. She has been asking the same question for many years, and no matter how many times we try to give her the answer, it does not assimilate. This is either because she is not following a proper sadhana or dedicated to moksa, or she is simply not qualified for self-inquiry. This is not a criticism, and though we really would like to help her, as I said, it is not our job to make her ‘believe’ in Vedanta because it is not a belief system.
But though Vedanta is not a religion, it takes the inquirer from dualistic worship of an external deity to the nondual understanding of the creative principle behind creation, Isvara. As I said last week, the most important fact to assimilate about bhakti is that bowing down to God is not an act of devotion but an act of jnanum, of knowledge. When I bow down to God/Isvara, the ego identity is dismantled. My ‘human consciousness’ or reflected consciousness, is surrendered to nondual Consciousness, my true identity. And equally important, my existence as a jiva becomes one with that of the God I bow down to because we share the same identity as Consciousness. I practice dharma and karma yoga effortlessly because it is the intelligent way to live, and I value peace of mind above all for the jiva. I stop worrying about everything. I have a much better life as a jiva as I manage my angels and demons, living not as perfect, but as my best self.
Living Your Best Life and Best Self
We all have angels of light and darkness in the mix of our personal conditioning. If we want peace of mind and freedom from limitation, we need to understand both, not to become a perfect person but to live as your best self because you understand that you are the Self. Herein lies all the teaching of Vedanta. It explains perfectly what the person and the creation is about, and how to end the reversal that the hypnosis of duality imposes on the mind with nondual thinking.
But as you all know, nonduality is very subtle because it requires subjectifying Consciousness as your true identity, and objectifying reflected consciousness as ‘not me’. This is a conundrum because it is not something the mind is capable of doing. How can an object, which is what the mind is, subjectify itself? It cannot because the object never knows the subject. An object is anything other than or known to, Consciousness. How to resolve the subject/object split? We must purify the mind so that it is qualified to hear the nondual teachings, and then, put them into practice. While no action a limited entity like the jiva can take will produce an unlimited result, self-inquiry is an action that can result in Self-knowledge, which is unlimited. While it is not an object to obtain but understood to be who you are, Self-realization is where the work of self-inquiry begins. This is because the personal identity, or ego, stands in the way of Self-actualization.
To follow dharma and live our best life, free of the jiva and free as a jiva, we need to purify the mind of projection (rajas) and denial (tamas), and any binding likes and dislikes arising from them that stand in the way of accessing Self-knowledge, so that the mind can be totally surrendered to God. And thus, directly experience the ever-present, unchanging bliss of the Self.
If you are happy with just knowing about the Self, so be it. But it’s not unlimited freedom from or for the jiva if the bliss is intermittent, so be honest about it. If ignorance of your true nature has been removed, you live as the Self, porous to what life brings you not because you are in denial, but because your likes and dislikes are negated and any remaining are non-binding. Either way, you are never more or less the Self. It is only a question of how much you are still prepared to suffer if ignorance still stands in the way of your full appreciation of your primary identity as the Self.
Two Things That Bedevil All Jivas: Projection and Denial
Rajas and The Predatory Assumption
Free floating anxiety is part of life for everyone under the spell of Maya because of the nature of mithya, or life. Nothing is certain, and the jiva above all, seeks safety. But there is no such thing in mithya. Life is always changing and challenging us. Think about things that don’t go your way and really get to you, big or small. Even a minor thing like someone cutting you off in traffic, how upsetting that can be, how angry we can get. Or someone says something seemingly innocent which enrages you. When we think someone causes us harm, we assume they intended it (it’s why we get so angry). We don’t stop to look at the real source of the anger (existential universal fear) because we immediately react and protection/defence takes over. This is projection and denial in action. This rajasic/tamasic tendency is called the predatory assumption, and it shapes our perceptions of everything, hurtling us into deep dissatisfaction seemingly at the drop of a hat. It can turn a good feeling into a bad one in a heartbeat.
Instead of seeing everything as me, the mind denies anything it needs to see as it really is, and projects its biased version onto the life or the “other”, who it sees as driven by malicious intent, ruthless, callous and happy to inflict harm. We only need to look at what’s happened to the fabric of society in the US to see this process in action, in the extreme. But it works out in our lives constantly, in ways big and small. Death by a million cuts, day in and day out.
Human nature is a strange thing, as the curse and blessing of self-reflectivity makes us so prone to projection and denial. But whatever the reason we feel attacked or hurt, we seldom stop to ask the most important question, which is: ‘is it really true, and whether or not it is, what is the message Isvara is sending me’? You can be sure there is one. Maybe it is just humility. As Marcus Aurelius, who was not a free person but a wise samsari, pointed out: “Reject your sense of injury, and the injury itself disappears.” Easier said than done, right? Self-knowledge makes this possible though, when or if it works. It gets to the heart of the matter, and negates the fear and self-doubt that lives in the minds of all human beings.
Procrastination and Denial are Signatures of Rajas and Tamas
All three gunas produce very predictable emotions, and once you understand the way they work, you can manage them. As with the rajasic predatory response, procrastination is a problem for most people. Who has not put off doing something you don’t feel like doing? Procrastination is part of human nature and no big deal if it is not your modus operandi in life. If it is a habit, it is usually poorly understood as a product of tamas. The common assessment is that procrastination is ‘just’ a matter of putting things off – laziness. But persistent laziness and denial in all its forms indicates a much bigger problem.
Entrenched procrastination is a depression response as a result of an emotion regulation problem. In most cases, procrastination is a strategy to avoid dealing with the source of the emotion behind it, which is always fear because what is guarded is painful. It is a way for the mind to focus on the immediate urgency of superficially coping with negative moods, rather than seeing what is behind them, and getting to what’s keeping you stuck and/or on with whatever task needs to be done. This is why we put things off.
Tamasic denial comes either in the form of extroverted attention, which is paying attention to anything other than what really needs attention. Or tamasic introversion, which is the opposite – outright and usually, unconscious denial. In either case, the worst kind of denial is the denial we are in denial about because we don’t know (and don’t want to know) we have it. Both extroverted or introverted denial mechanisms can be coping tools to manage a form of ‘functional depression’. This is because when we deny what is, or we cannot see how we are projecting and denying binding likes and dislikes that keep us stuck, we never feel good about ourselves. Self-doubt and shame plague us. Depression sets in when there is a lack of congruence between our highest values and living dharmically, and how we actually live.
Rajas and Tamas The Terrible Twins
We have all seen this play out in our lives at some point. Projection and denial, rajas and tamas, go hand in hand. When these two troublemakers are persistently active, we become fascinated by and enmeshed in the surface or immediate emotional fabric of our lives, and the mind (ego) works hard to push back the pressure of the samskaras, binding likes and dislikes, behind them. Some people’s lives are messy and dysfunctional as a result. Some are functionally and/or unconsciously depressed. Some get dragged down completely into full blown depression. Or the opposite, some manage this psychological blockage by adopting the happy go lucky persona, the one who always seems sunny and cheerful, the archetypical clown face.
Maybe who even knows about the Self, and who, to apparent outward appearances anyway, seems to be living free of the personal identity. But it is not really. As I pointed out repeatedly, if you really want to live a nondual life, your life must follow dharma impeccably and clean up your act. There is no fine print. To do so requires facing up to the things you project outwardly and inwardly deny and try to hide from yourself. So….
Are You Awareness, Or Are You an Aware Mess?
While living as an aware mess is better than an unaware mess, it is certainly no recipe for peace of mind. We all want to live nonduality, right? That is why you are here, and are so consistent in your sadhana. Assuming you are, of course. If you are a dedicated inquirer who has realized you must be the Self, even if it is not hard and fast knowledge yet, the issue is no longer who am I? It is now how do I live who I am? The burning question becomes “how can I embody the teaching for my benefit, the benefit of others and for the benefit of the teaching tradition?” Remember, this is a nondual reality, and all is one. We can no longer ignore or try to sweep away any part of it. All must fall under the unwavering gaze of the Self – nondual vision.
Here is the part that really needs to sink in:
Self-realization doesn’t remove the karma that caused me to seek the Self. Though it will greatly improve my life, it will not magically ‘fix’ me or my life. It ‘only’ eliminates self-doubt. This is huge, as self-doubt is the curse that comes with the gift of self-reflectivity. But unfortunately, once prarabdha karma is in the pipeline, like a bullet shot from a gun, you cannot stop it from reaching its target. So if you are in denial about your binding tendencies and think you don’t care because ‘it’s just the body’, or it’s ‘just mithya’, the karma associated with my body and mind continues to fructify all the same. Suffering will ensue, not to mention that peace of mind will elude you.
So, are you unlimited Awareness, or a limited aware mess?
The thing is, once Vedanta convinces me of my true identity, and I know that I am not the person, but the Self, I don’t feel good about myself unless I am living up to my highest value, living as my best self and my best life, which is not only living dharmically but freedom and non-dual love. Maybe you didn’t read the fine print when you signed on to the logic of Vedanta. But it’s there. Once you know, Self-knowledge won’t leave you alone. Isvara will relentlessly turn up the heat, you can bet on that. You can run but you can’t hide. from the all seeing eye of the I.
So, give in and do the work. Let it finally sink in: I must put the teachings into practice. Make this year the year you do this, impeccably.
You Can Change and Manage Isvara
The life we experience, the field of experience, is run by the gunas, i.e., by Isvara. We as jivas are not in control of the gunas and cannot change them. But if we understand how to manage them, we can take the appropriate actions at the appropriate time so that we maximize their positive aspects and minimize their negative aspects for peace of mind. The key to freedom is managing our feelings and the repetitive thought patterns that give rise to them through guna management. From this perspective, even if the mind is not peaceful (sattvic), it does not interfere with our baseline experience as the Self, satya.”
This is the essence of the guna teaching. The only meaningful way to change the habitual patterns the mind runs on is to make a permanent change on the Causal level, through Self-knowledge. Here it seems that there are two things going on, which there always is (apparently). Let me explain.
1. Cause and Effect – Mithya: To change things on the mithya, or cause and effect level, we need to follow dharma, practice bhakti yoga, karma yoga, and have a sattvic lifestyle. In this way, even though the mind is conditioned by the Causal body, to render binding likes and dislikes non-binding, we must re-educate the ego and subjugate it to the knowledge that it is not in control. One can put this into practice without guna knowledge, or discrimination between satya, pure nondual Consciousness, and mithya, reflected consciousness, duality. This greatly improves life for the jiva, but it is not moksa.
2. Satya, Living Nonduality: For moksa to obtain, Self-knowledge must free the mind of bondage to and identification with the body/mind, entirely. This requires guna knowledge and satya – mithya discrimination, which if Self-knowledge assimilates, makes a permanent change in the Causal body – in Isvara. It is possible to effect a change in the Causal body because there is a common identity between Isvara and the jiva, which is non-reflected, or nondual Consciousness. But this is not easy because until ignorance is completely eradicated, there is still identification with the person, and their likes and dislikes. This is why nididhysana is usually the longest part of self-inquiry.
Essentially, these two points elucidate the difference between secular karma yoga, which is for doers, and jnana yoga, which is for inquirers qualified for moksa. Last week I talked about the four basic obstacles to moksa that can keep us stuck, so I won’t repeat them here. Basically, Self-actualization obtains when Self-knowledge has eradicated all duality and bad habits, and the identification with the person is no more. Here, satya mithya discrimination no longer applies because you are what is actual. Ignorance and knowledge are both objects known to you. The mind is under new management, and the tail is not wagging the dog anymore.
I Give Back to Isvara and Live in Gratitude
Don’t you want the bliss of the Self permanently, not just intermittently? If I do and I am living my best life, I live in gratitude as a matter of course. I discharge my debt to my teacher and the scripture, which have given me the greatest gift this life can give, to set me free of limitation and the ignorance and of my true nature. It is my duty and only natural and appropriate to reciprocate. And how do I do this? By living the teachings and being a shining beacon of light for myself, and for all life, seeing as they are known to be one and the same.
Make Your Sankalpas and Live By Them!
A sankalpa is a fervent commitment to achieve a goal. So, here we emphasize again: make those sankalpas, and live by them!
Sankalpa Checklist
1. Fearless Moral Inventory. Conduct a fearless moral inventory. Make sure your values are in line with the scripture. The same with the qualifications. Make a list of both, take a note of where your values are not in line with what you value most, as well as what qualifications need work.
2. Karma Yoga. Be really honest about whether or not you are really practicing karma yoga – consecrating all thoughts, words and deeds as they appear to Isvara, taking the result as a gift. Or have you learned how to dodge blowback karma by suppressing your likes and dislikes, avoiding all conflict or simply stuffing it down deeper into the unconsciousnding, pretending that it’s karma yoga?
3. Dharma. Be honest about where the jiva conditioning tends to break dharma. Don’t judge your (not) self, but keep track of all of it. What price freedom? Being ‘disciplined’ is only hard work to start off with. When you realize that you start liking yourself a whole lot more, pat yourself on the back for sticking with the program, but give the credit to Self-knowledge at work removing ignorance.
Breaking bad habits is not easy, we know this. But if you want freedom above all, what could possibly be more valuable? Being disciplined means becoming a disciple unto the Self. And you can do it because you are it.
4. Projection and Denial. Track yourself on your projections and denials – rajasic fear-based reactivity, and denial-based procrastination are both emotion regulation problems. Therefore, they are guna management problems. Go for the guna.
5. Speech and Hearing Tapas. Make a very firm commitment to control your speech, and how you hear. If your speech is not under guna management, you will constantly be projecting and procrastinating, so this is how you will be hearing, and conflict ensues. Practice keeping silent unless you really have something kind/useful/interesting/valuable to say.
6. Devotional Practice. Start a devotional and gratitude practice if you don’t have one.
7. Reciprocate by living moksa, and as your best self.
The Take Away to Live a Dharmic Life
We most likely all have heard the saying that happiness is an inside job. It sounds like such a cliche, but no truer words are spoken. We always have everything we need to be happy between our two ears. It doesn’t exist anywhere else. Moksa is a state of mind. We not only have this magnificent sophisticated instrument called a mind, which can be our best friend or worst enemy. We have the great good fortune of finding the nondual teachings of Vedanta, which give us the crystal clear logic of Existence. There is no greater gift in this life than for us to be released from the prison of Maya and have the spell of duality finally removed by Self Knowledge.
What a gift.
We wish you all a glorious start to the ‘new’ year, with the prayer that you will commit to living moksa in every moment of every day by using the tools that Vedanta provides you with to meet life as Isvara presents it to you, with Self-knowledge.
Sundari
